'Yes, and the Assessor's sled,' said I.

There was nothing for it but to hurry down after him and seek out the authorities and set them in pursuit; and so we hurried as much as can be hurried over such a road, tired, silent, and hungry, and both secretly nettled to the point of madness at having been so easily circumvented by one small boy.

'Little boys are more pestilential than almost anything I know,' said Vicki, after a period of speechless crunching over the snow.

'Far more than anything I know,' said I.

'I'm thankful I did not marry,' said she.

'So am I,' said I.

'The world's much too full of them as it is,' said she.

'Much,' said I.

'Oh,' she cried suddenly, stamping her foot, 'if I could only get hold of him—wicked, wicked little wretch!'

'What would you do?' I asked, curious to see if her plans were at all like mine.